Bridging
by Twisted Mackeral
Summary: Everybody loves Gerudo. Right?


When you're suspended over a two hundred meter drop on a half-built bridge of your own construction, you take pride and great care in the standard of your carpentry.

We'd been contracted in two weeks ago to repair the bridge spanning the gorge into Gerudo Fortress, after the previous one mysteriously cut itself in two. Why, was anyone's guess. We were twenty miles from their Fortress and technically at war with them; if they didn't want a bridge here there was little we could do long-term about it. But somebody high up had demanded the bridge be repaired (as a demonstration of diplomacy or something) and so here I am - on a bridge, up a gorge, the left side of my body drenched with icy spray from the ear-deadening waterfall, the right side of my body being burnt away by the vicious sun, and my hands a mess of raw skin, blisters and splinters.

Painfully, I pull the last plank of the day into place, take a nail out from between my teeth, positioned it over the corner of the plank, heft my hammer -

"CHARLIE!"

The hammer misses the nail. My finger goes crunch.

"Fraaaerggh!"

"CHARLIE!"

Mutoh, head carpenter, is a large, powerful man with an equally large, powerful voice, which he uses to scream at me with the utmost urgency every hour about various emergencies, like he can't find his socks, or there's a spider in the tent, or he's hungry. By the higher, more desperate pitch of his voice, I can tell that it is the latter. He continues to shout my name for the next several minutes as I finish nailing down the board. As hungry as he is, he's deathly afraid of heights (not that I could blame him) and hangs back away from the ravine edge. Comfortable that the board is secure, I slide the hammer into my belt and make my way back to solid ground, sucking my finger. It is still pounding, though the pain is gradually becoming lost in the more generalized mass of pain that is my hand.

It's always enjoyable to see Mutoh preparing for a bellow. His mouth opens wide and begins to suck in air, his mustache flutters in this onrush, and his chest swells out. There's a pause and then the shouting begins.

"WHAT TIME DO YOU CALL THIS?"

"Dinner time?"

"DAMN RIGHT! SO WHERE'S DINNER?"

"Coming up, boss," I sigh.

"DAMN RIGHT! MY MEN CAN'T WORK ON AN EMPTY STOMACH!"

This is not wrong. The men can't work on a full stomach either. They can't really do anything on any stomach, except drink and talk about Gerudo women. As I said, we started construction on the bridge two weeks ago. I don't know how much you know about carpentry, but it should not take two weeks to build a bridge, especially when the threat of immediate kidnap and/or torture and/or death is hanging over one's head. But then "we" didn't exactly start construction. I did, and have been working on it alone ever since.

Not to mention they forgot to bring most of the building supplies (they remembered the food and beverage supplies of course). I've been having to improvise, dismantling the food crates as they eat their way through them and turning them into bits of bridge. At least I can always rely on them to produce a supply of empty food crates.

The tool belt hangs heavy on my waist. I take it off and drop it by the tent before going to fetch firewood. There are a lot of dead and dessicated trees around here so it doesn't take long and I'm within sight of the tent at all times. Even still, the belt is gone when I get back. There's the dimple in the sand where it fell and my footprints next to it, but no others. This isn't the first time this has happened. I glance up at the steep walls of the canyon in which we pitched camp. The sun is just sinking behind them, filling them with deep, dark shadows. I doubt I'd be able to see them in broad daylight anyway.

"Sir, did you move my tools?" I call into the tent, aware that neither he nor any of the other sloths would have any use for them.

"Lost another one, boy?" Mutoh replies.

"I don't think it's been lost, sir. More like it's been found." I'm keeping my eyes on the canyon walls as I speak.

"What are you blithering about now?"

"I think they took it."

This stirs an immediate response. The tent is almost pulled apart as four large men climb over each other to get out of it.

The other four carpenters need little description. They're all like Mutoh, only a little smaller and lazier. They stand around, searching eagerly, puffing themselves up and sucking in their guts, which is about as successful as sucking a donkey through the eye of a needle. I go about my cooking duties, a little more comfortable now that I have company; none of the carpenters can fight but I'm pretty certain I could out-run them if need be.

"Where are they then?" Paul demands shortly.

"Presumably they're hiding," I say, as my swollen hands fumble with the flint and tinder.

Paul snorts. "Hiding? You ever seen a redhead trying to hide?"

His voice is loud enough to echo off the canyon walls, which worries me greatly.

One of them starts saying "heeeere Gerudo, Gerudo, Gerudo. Here girl," and the other morons join in. My stomach sinks. I hope to the Goddesses that if the Gerudo really are watching us, they don't associate me with them. Oh Gods. I'm going to be stabbed to death in my sleep.

"Here, Gerudo Gerudo. Come here, Gerudo," Paul calls.

"We won't hurt you," John says.

"Yeah, we don't bite," George smirks.

"Much," Ringo predictably follows up with.

"I heard they cut off their left breast so the can wield a bow better."

"I heard they have three bre-"

"Dinners ready!" I cut in loudly. It works. Quickly bored of the non-appearance of half-naked female warriors, they amble over to seat their large frames around the fire. Dinner is far from ready, and I've barely even gotten the fire started, but they pass the time by emptying a keg of ale and talking loudly over each other about girls.

The meal tonight is soup and a sandwich. I cook as fast as possible, choke it down, and retire for the night. The dark has set in quickly and entirely by now and I'm physically exhausted, but my ears keep jumping at the slightest noise. It's several hours after the others have finally fallen drunkenly into their sleeping bags before I fall asleep.

I sleep well and don't get stabbed.


End file.
